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Invenergy Trips Over Its Grain Belt Lies

8/24/2022

Investigative journalism is not dead! It can still be found digging away at the Mexico Ledger in Mexico, Missouri. Managing Editor Alan Dale smells a story and he's determined to tell it. This week, he asked Invenergy nine questions about its project, and then several follow-ups, one of which caught Invenergy in a lie (surprise! surprise!)

Here's how Dale caught Invenergy in its own lie:

Have you entered any new agreements with any potential partners or “customers” who will use the Grain Belt and the connector?
We have an existing contract with a consortium of 39 Missouri communities to take power from the Grain Belt Express at an annual savings for $12.8 million, and we see very strong market interest in transmission capacity from the line, which is one factor in the recent announcement to expand local delivery capacity.
Will you move forward prior to an agreement or wait until you get enough before beginning construction?
Kuykendall: “We will begin construction after acquiring the necessary easements and approvals from regulators.”

Because that answer was obviously baloney, Dale asked a follow up:

So, to clarify customers that pay into Grain Belt Express through money or service, who, if anyone, have you entered into an agreement with? If you have no one paying into the line - a customer - you are saying you would build anyway? Or do you want to expand on this?
Kuykendall: ““Grain Belt Express will be bringing power to 350,000 electric consumers across Missouri through a signed transmission service agreement with the Missouri Joint Municipal Electric Utility Commission (MJMEUC) representing 39 Missouri municipal utilities. Grain Belt Express has seen strong interest in the market and expects to secure additional customer agreements prior to construction beginning.”

Oh, that's right... Grain Belt Express *DOES* need customers to pay for the project before it builds. Why? Because Invenergy is claiming that the project will cost $7B. They're going to need a construction loan for the project, and the lender is going to need a reasonable expectation of being repaid, such as the project having paying customers that would produce a revenue stream to make timely loan payments. Duh. How dumb does Invenergy think we are anyhow?

Grain Belt also admits that it will need additional customers, in addition to the MJMEUC customer. That's because the MJMEUC contract is for "up to 200 MW" of capacity. GBE is planning to make available 2500 MW of capacity in Missouri. MJMEUC is less than 10% of the capacity offered. In addition, MJMEUC got a sweet, sweet deal because they were used by Grain Belt to show the Missouri PSC that there was some "benefit" to Missouri. Grain Belt witnesses testified at PSC hearings that MJMEUC received a "loss leader" contract price that was actually less than it cost GBE to provide the service. Invenergy isn't going to be making any construction loan payments with its proceeds from MJMEUC.

So, where are the other customers? They do not exist!! Despite all the overly optimistic blather about the customers GBE "expects", the customers are just not there.

So you might wonder... what's the rush to get Tiger Connector approved? What's the rush to acquire land? What's the rush, Invenergy, when you don't have enough customers to make your project economic?

And, let's check out some of the other prevarications in Invenergy's answers.

What measures will the company actually take to minimize negative impacts for affected landowners?
Kuykendall: “Missouri stakeholders have urged Invenergy to develop solutions to deliver more power to Missouri from the Grain Belt Express project. The Tiger Connector is necessary to meet that request, and in doing so provide billions in energy savings to Missourians.

Wait a tick... who are these "stakeholders?" Do they have names? Do they even exist? I'm thinking they do not because who, other than a customer, would urge GBE to make more capacity available in Missouri? And we know GBE doesn't have any customers other than MJMEUC. If the "stakeholders" are real, Invenergy should name them. If not, they don't exist.

And then there's the matter of eminent domain:

What will the company do to avoid condemnation, which is likely the biggest issue?
Kuykendall: “This is always a last resort for us. We’ve already acquired 84 percent of the parcels needed along the Phase I portion of the Grain Belt Express HVDC route, with nearly all of them coming through voluntary easements.

Oh, look... "nearly", my favorite weasel word! "Voluntary" is an inappropriate description of acquiring easements through threat of condemnation. I'd even go so far as to say that none of the easements are voluntary since they weren't offered before Grain Belt Express land agents came calling. Kuykendall also forgets to mention that Invenergy has already filed a number of condemnation lawsuits that are currently working their way through the Missouri court system. Why must Invenergy condemn land NOW for a project that doesn't have enough customers to get built? Will Invenergy surrender these easements when it can't find enough customers? Grain Belt's current permit from the MO PSC requires that Grain Belt give back any easements it has acquired through condemnation if it doesn't use them within 5 years. Which brings us to the next bit of propaganda...

Can you confirm that Invenergy intends to honor the 7-year Sunset revision on easements as stated in the law?
Kuykendall: “The company is still reviewing that provision of (House Bill 2005) and expects this issue to be addressed in any regulatory filings before the Missouri Public Service Commission. As you know, HB2005 does not apply to Grain Belt Express and any commitment to comply with portions of the law would be voluntary in nature.”

That's right... Grain Belt only gets 5 years, not 7. But since the Missouri ag organizations generously gave 2 years away to Invenergy in HB 2005, perhaps Invenergy can add another two years? No wonder they're being cagey. But, never fear, dear landowner, Invenergy says:

We will engage further with the Missouri Farm Bureau, other ag groups, and the Missouri Public Service Commission to implement these commitments to balance energy affordability and reliability and landowner interests in Missouri.”

What landowner rights do you suppose they will give away on your behalf next? Only YOU can look out for YOU, not some special interest group that has other issues to pursue.

And let's end with Invenergy's complete and utter nonsense about burying transmission:

Will Invenergy move lines from the middle of fields? Bury lines?
Kuykendall: “We will propose a route that takes the input gathered from these public meetings into account. We understand the desire for some or all parts of the Tiger Connector line to be buried. Undergrounding the Tiger Connector would require burying two separate transmission systems to meet safety and reliability requirements. This makes undergrounding a non-starter.

“The Tiger Connector line will have one circuit for MISO and one circuit for AECI.
“Overhead line maintenance can be performed by shutting down one circuit while the other continues to deliver power.
“This is not possible underground because workers cannot work with a live circuit present, and federal reliability requirements prohibit a system design that would shut down power delivery to multiple markets at once. This would require two separate buried systems.
“Undergrounding would also have much greater impacts on ag operations, including:
Eight times as much land permanently taken out of production.
Over 80 times the excavation that can reduce yields from compaction and soil mixing.
Permanent “call before you dig” requirements for landowners in easement areas.
Ag impacts result from:
Excavating two buried cable trenches across the entire length of the line – with the trenches separated sixty feet from each other. Recent studies of other buried infrastructure projects have shown reduced yields for corn and beans between 15-25 percent due to compaction and the mixing of topsoil and subsoil caused by trenching.
Installation of permanent access bunkers which are like U-Haul trucks parked in the ground every 2,000 feet in pairs, one along each set of buried cables. Crops cannot be grown over these, and each set would be farmed around.
“In addition to the significant land impacts, this request could set a precedent for other future transmission lines in Missouri, representing billions of dollars in added costs for Missouri electric consumers over time.
“Stakeholders have cited the importance of balancing energy affordability and reliability while also serving landowner interests. Burying any part of Grain Belt Express would fail both of these goals.”
Kuykendall added these statistics to the response:
1.3 acres permanently out of production, vs. 0.16 acres
484,853 total cubic yards of soil excavation for undergrounding, vs. 5,759 cubic yards for monopole foundations

You need to bury two separate systems? Why? Are there two separate transmission lines? Workers can't be near a live circuit underground, but they can be near one above ground? If you can shut off the current to an aerial circuit, why can't you shut off current to a buried circuit? Point us to these "safety and reliability requirements" you quote. Or maybe you're simply making the whole thing up? I think Invenergy is trying much too hard to repel the idea of undergrounding the lines. None of this makes actual sense. It makes my logic bone ache.

Burial would have greater impacts on agriculture? Only if you buried the line on new rights of way across agricultural land, but that's not necessary at all. Buried transmission can be sited alongside existing road and rail rights of way, where they can bury the U-Haul truck vaults that allow faults to be repaired without digging up the entire line (something Invenergy recently claimed elsewhere). The beauty of buried electric cables is that they can go on existing linear easements. Nobody condemns a new right of way in order to bury a cable for some sort of infrastructure, they use the ones that already exist.

Oh, God forbid Invenergy set a precedent for building a transmission line that does not cause permanent impacts for farmers! What a horrid thing! Because it's really not that much more expensive when you consider the millions of dollars Grain Belt has spent over the past decade fighting landowner groups, buying influence, and pumping out the propaganda. Add to that the cost of 10 years of delay, and it probably costs the same as burying it on existing rights of way from the get-go.

And hey, look, there's those mysterious "stakeholders" again. Who ARE these people? And why should they speak for what landowners want? Only landowners should determine how the project affects them. It's their land, not mysterious stakeholder's. Mysterious stakeholder has not been out there alongside the landowner over the decades, pouring his mysterious blood, sweat, and tears into the land. Mysterious stakeholder needs to shut his pie hole... if he's anything more than a sock puppet being used by Invenergy.

I really can't wait for Alan Dale's next article!!! Please let him know how much you appreciate his reporting on Grain Belt Express!

2 Comments

Hiding Information in Plain Sight

7/25/2022

1 Comment

I've watched a lot of transmission projects come and go, but never have I seen a project that has been so hidden from public notice. Think about it: If the public never finds out about it, then they won't form opposition, hire lawyers, and intervene at the PSC. They also won't generate any negative media or political unpopularity. A transmission project hidden from public notice is traveling a stressful road richly studded with hidden landmines. In my opinion, it's a stupid idea headed for failure.

Grain Belt Express "Tiger Connector" transmission project was barely mentioned in Invenergy's press releases earlier this month. It was hidden in plain sight on the second page of the release, a place reporters rarely go, especially if the "important" talking points are bulleted for them on the first page. Local press didn't even mention it. No story, no public notice, no participation, no opposition.

When the project was announced, the few maps that circulated were vague dotted lines on a zoomed out map that only included major roadways. Transmission developers ALWAYS have detailed aerial photography maps available at Open House dog and pony shows, and increasingly these developers share their maps online well in advance of the "meetings". Seeing a detailed map of their property with a new transmission line drawn in is often the trigger point for landowners. But if Invenergy keeps these maps hidden until just two days before the Open House, then less landowners will have an opportunity to see them. Less notification, less participation at the Open House, less opposition.

And speaking of those Open House "meetings" they are always, and I do mean ALWAYS, the subject of a well-circulated press release for local media, along with paid advertising in print, radio, TV and internet. The idea of holding these meetings is to gather public input. But if the public doesn't know about these meetings because the transmission developer has not adequately advertised them with plenty of notice, then the public probably won't attend. No attendance, no maps, no participation, no opposition.

Invenergy mailed a letter to what it called "impacted landowners" notifying them of the Open House meetings just two weeks in advance. Actual delivery of the letters was well within that two-week window. And who is checking to make sure Invenergy's list of "impacted landowners" is accurate? Even the best transmission developers miss large numbers of "impacted landowners" at this stage, which is why they also buy advertisements and press reporters for news stories. They may actually want the public to find out and attend the "meetings." But if a landowner doesn't get a letter, or has a scheduling conflict, then they miss out. No notification, no attendance, no participation, no opposition.

Invenergy has performed a parody of "public notice" for its Tiger Connector transmission project by not using industry best practices for public notice and hiding "information" in plain sight in places landowners would never look.

The Public Service Commission should be very concerned about these shady practices. Your elected officials should also be concerned about it. Please let them know how disappointed you are in "public notice" shortcuts for this project.

You can submit an online comment to the PSC here. The case number is EA-2023-0017.

Invenergy has created a "virtual public meeting" on its website. According to earlier statements, it will only be available for a very short time. You can visit it here.

Be sure to check out the aerial photographic maps all the way at the bottom of the page. If you don't see them, or can't make them function (which has already been a complaint) you may need to change or update your internet browser. Don't give up! But, then again, if half the internet visitors can't access the maps because they are not designed to operate in a wide-variety of internet browsers, then less people see them (we're really developing a theme here!)

The rest of the page is what I call propaganda. Let's review.

"New power delivery" In fact, Invenergy claims 2 nuclear power plants worth. Reality: Grain Belt is a MERCHANT transmission project. That means that it will only deliver power to an entity that has signed a contract to pay to use the power line. Grain Belt cannot and will not just "deliver power" in general. "Existing customers" have contracted for just 10% of Grain Belt's capacity, although 20% of its new capacity has been offered for years with no takers. That's right, nobody has purchased 250 MW of service in Missouri that GBE has been offering for years. All the propaganda and marketing spiel in the world cannot make electric distributors in Missouri buy something they don't need. Missourians know the story about painting Tom Sawyer's fence very well. If nobody wants it now, it's probably not marketable.

"New local jobs, spending and tax revenue!" But selling 2 nuclear power plants worth of extra energy into Callaway County directly competes with the reliable sources of energy Callaway already relies on, such as Ameren's Callaway Energy Center. The nuclear power plant currently provides thousands of good paying jobs and millions of dollars in tax revenue and local community charities. Which would provide more? I think it is the Callaway Energy Center, hands down. Absolutely no contest. A bird in hand is worth more than the promise of two in the bush.

Invenergy's "experience." They say, "Invenergy knowns (sic) how to build the right way and has relationships with over 12,000 landowners, more than 80 percent of whom are farmers and ranchers." But reality is that nearly 100% of these "farmers and ranchers" signed voluntary agreements with the company because they were promised royalties or other payments that "share in the wealth" of Invenergy's land use. Transmission lines make a one-time "market value" payment for the perpetual use of your land. No matter how much money Invenergy makes from the transmission line, your compensation will not increase. Invenergy has recently begun condemning the land of folks who won't sign voluntarily.

The cheaper Grain Belt Express is to build, the bigger profit for Invenergy. GBE is approved to sell its service at market rates. The price GBE charges is set by market forces. It is not reliant on its cost to build and operate. While regulators can limit a jurisdictional utility's profit, the sky's the limit with Grain Belt Express! Nobody can hold their profit in check. And the cheaper the project is to build and operate, the more profit is in it for Invenergy! Perhaps that why, after promising single structure "monopoles" to landowners for a decade, Invenergy recently changed the structures after it purchased the bankrupt project from Clean Line Energy Partners. Invenergy says all transmission structures will now be cheaper 4-legged lattice construction. Promising monopoles seems to be a Grain Belt Express bait and switch.

All this same information will be decorating Grain Belt's venue tomorrow and Wednesday on strategically placed poster board easels manned by perky but clueless company representatives. But we all know that the only thing people come to see are the maps.

Make your plan to attend:

Audrain County
Tuesday, July 26
Knights of Columbus
9584 State Hwy 15, Mexico, MO
65265
Meeting 1
12:00 p.m. to 2:00p.m.
OR
Meeting 2
5:00p.m. to 7:00p.m.

Callaway County
Wednesday, July 27
John C Harris Community Center
350 Sycamore St, Fulton, MO
65251
Meeting 1
12:00 p.m. to 2:00p.m.
OR
Meeting 2
5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.

Don't let Invenergy get away with preventing you from getting information about a project that could have devastating effects on your home, your business and your community!

1 Comment

Magic Math Is For Fools

7/21/2022

0 Comments

In case you missed it last week, Invenergy posted an "Analysis Summary: Impact of Grain Belt Express on Kansas and Missouri Ratepayers." It goes something like this:

Low-cost modeling process market consultants assuming estimated wind generation projected average reduce expected potential forward-looking wholesale market impacts revenue requirement controllability assessment aggregates combined impacts lower inclusion utility investment the collective partial revenue requirement average approximately production capacity factor flat production profile evening peak electric demand SPP MISO regions wholesale electric costs region spanning prices price spread opportunity arbitrage nodes average annual basis off-peak price differences translate Kansas and Missouri. Billions.

That was my take away. It really is that obtuse and meaningless. I don't think it's meant to be understood. I think maybe it's meant to be held by well-fed, middle-aged "economic development" big fish in small ponds while they slap each other on the back and bloviate knowingly about "savings" from Grain Belt Express. You know these guys as well as I do... they've got a finger in everyone's pie and they trade in "Do You Know Who I AM?" Jack of all trades, master of none, small government sycophant who likes to pretend he knows everything about energy and his opinion is gold.

Except... if you quizzed these guys they'd quickly find something more important to do than talk to you, or simply get angry at you for implying they are a know-nothing waste of flesh. They're probably on their way to find out what Invenergy can do for them. Quid pro quo, you know.

First of all... GBE is just a transmission line. It doesn't sell power. Power purchased separately. How in the world did this variable get handled in the opaque report? Notice how the variables are not identified, much less the equation shared? My 8th grade Algebra teacher would give Invenergy an "F" and send it to the principal's office for not showing its work.

Fugheddaboutit. Here's all you need to know about electricity prices in Kansas and Missouri.

See that? The price of electricity in Kansas is 10.38 cents per kWh. The price of electricity in Missouri is 9.64 cents per kWh. So if we export electricity from Kansas and make it available for use in Missouri, it will RAISE electric prices in Missouri, not lower them. In addition, Missouri ratepayers would need to add the $7B, that's BILLION, dollar price tag of Grain Belt Express to their equation, since Invenergy claims it necessary in its report.

There, wasn't that simpler and a whole lot more logical?

0 Comments

Invenergy Manufactures News

7/13/2022

2 Comments

The decline of journalism over the past 20 years or so would shock your grandfather, who lived in news' heyday. Investigative journalism is dead. Main stream media no longer reports the facts... it reports an agenda. Reporters are now less valued and more overworked than ever. Today's reporters have grown lazy about verifying facts and have become a staid, incurious bunch. They no longer want to tell both sides of the story. They simply repackage corporate and government press releases without verifying anything or providing any balance to the story. They are nothing more than media puppets. The bad news is that corporations can now pretty much write their own news, true or false. The other bad news is that you need to look elsewhere for the truth. There is no good news. Journalists say that the internet ruined the news industry, but perhaps the news industry ruined itself by losing its impartiality and accuracy to corporate overlords.

And Invenergy took full advantage of it on Monday, pumping out stories like this AP blurb that was sent around the country to use as filler. What does it say?

Grain Belt Express has been expanded so that it would "match" the power of 4 nuclear power plants.
Investment has increased to $7B.
Some municipalities intended to use the line for a "long" time.
There will be some magical amount of "savings."
Some advocacy groups love it.
"Some" farmers don't want the project.

Where's the mention of "Tiger Connector" which is a 40-mile transmission extension through virgin ground? There's "some" more farmers who are going to be furiously opposed to that. How did this happen? Invenergy's press release, news conference, and the fact that the average reporter had about 10 minutes to spend on this story combined to create a "story" full of non-news that buried the real news of an expansion of GBE's route and intent to use eminent domain in Missouri.

As you'll notice in the press release, the Tiger Connector is buried on page 2, past the bulleted list of important points. No reporter read that far. They stopped at the bulleted list because it was there that Invenergy had so conveniently summarized the important points. But those weren't the important points. They were just complete nonsense and fluff designed to bury the Tiger Connector story. And it worked. Thanks a lot, lazy reporters.

Also take a look at GBE's website. Where's the Tiger Connector? Oh, here it is, one page deep, where a curious reporter would never find it. And it's not part of the "Route" page where someone would look for the route of the project. It doesn't exist on the route. It has its own separate tab, which is unexplained, and the page contains nothing of any value to anyone. I've been doing transmission for nearly 15 years now and I've never seen a new transmission project rolled out with so little actual information. There aren't even any maps for residents of newly affected counties to see. It doesn't even mention where this project might want to go. It's almost like Invenergy is HIDING this new proposal.

Is Invenergy embarrassed that it has spent so much time and money on a route that isn't even viable for the project because it could not connect to the grid at any points even close to the route it has been buying and condemning for years? Is Invenergy embarrassed because it still doesn't have any customers aside from the loss-leader municipality contract for only "up to" 250 MW?

Nah, I think they did this on purpose as a ploy to keep this information from any landowners who could object to the plan and challenge it at the PSC. If there is no information about it in the news, nobody would know. If the information is hard to find on GBE's website, nobody will find it. If they do find it, there is no detail that might set an affected landowner off. If GBE doesn't mail notification letters to affected landowners until AFTER the news conference, and dangerously close to the "Open House" dog and pony show "meetings," nobody would know. We have yet to see one of these notifications show up, but they may be designed to look like a junk mail postcard you'd toss right into the trash without reading. If that happens, nobody would know. GBE didn't "announce" the details of its Open House meetings until AFTER the news conference, therefore the media would not publish that information and nobody would know about it.

Here's the information. Spread it around because GBE is hiding it and the media isn't interested in public notice.

Audrain County
Tuesday, July 26
Knights of Columbus
9584 State Hwy 15, Mexico, MO
65265
Meeting 1
12:00 p.m. to 2:00p.m.
OR
Meeting 2
5:00p.m. to 7:00p.m.

Callaway County
Wednesday, July 27
John C Harris Community Center
350 Sycamore St, Fulton, MO
65251
Meeting 1
12:00 p.m. to 2:00p.m.
OR
Meeting 2
5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.

The public meetings will be open house format and attendees can come and go as they please during meeting hours. No formal presentation will be given. For those unable to attend in person, there is a self-paced Virtual Open House that is accessible on the website anytime between July 25 and August 5, 2022.

Got it? The information for landowners is only available for 12 days. If you miss that time frame, or the meetings (like say, you did something completely outrageous like GO ON VACATION in the middle of summer), then you're out of luck. You don't get any information. That's outrageous!

Ya know... real public notice that isn't actually trying to HIDE things is always sent to the media, who could help notify the public. What are you trying to pull Invenergy?

Invenergy says Tiger Connector is just a small change and the story is elsewhere. No sane person would believe that! Maybe opposition doesn't need GBE to help tell their story. Maybe Invenergy is about to get slammed. There's no way they're getting this through the PSC as a minor change that nobody minds. In fact, the Missouri PSC said it was not a "change" and that Grain Belt Express has to file a whole new application for these changes. Oops! Nice try, Invenergy, but did you actually think that was going to work?

Next, let's look at those manufactured talking points Invenergy fed to the press and analyze how useful they actually are, and whether they have a chance of biting back.

GBE will now be the equivalent of 4 new nuclear power plants. Sorry, but GBE does not generate energy. Maybe they meant that it could deliver the equivalent of 4 new nuclear power plants, if it actually had interconnection requests to inject that much power (but that's a different blog). But where would that power be generated? Not in Missouri. It would be generated elsewhere and imported. And if Missouri imported the power of 4 nukes located in Kansas, then an equivalent amount of Missouri generation would close, maybe even actual nuclear plants, like the Callaway Generating Station owned by Ameren that employs a lot of people and pays a lot of taxes in Callaway County. Ya know, maybe this wasn't really a smart talking point.

Investment increases to $7B. How in the world did GBE go from its historic $2B price tag under Clean Line Energy Partners to today's $7B price tag? Even with today's sky-high inflation, that's impossible. Even the cost of the Tiger Connector couldn't get this transmission project to $7B. Maybe there's more to this story than a transmission line.

What's that you say? $7B of new wind projects? So the investment isn't just a transmission line? What'cha building, Invenergy, and where's the check on your market power when you're "negotiating" with other wind developers to take service from the line? No chance that Invenergy could negotiate a better price with itself than it would negotiate with a competitor. No chance at all...

Invenergy trots out the same old, tired "customers" who got the deal of a lifetime to take service at below cost rates. I notice these customers didn't figure prominently in Invenergy's fluffy press release. Invenergy found some new friends to "cheer" for it. 2-4-6-8 What are we here to validate? Rah! Rah! Rah!

Magical savings. Because Invenergy hired some company to toss a word salad that concludes there will be all these magical savings that real people just can't figure out. It's all made up crap and they won't show you their math. You're supposed to trust the results. But without seeing the figures used to calculate these savings, it cannot be verified. They could have put anything in their equation (and maybe they did!). It's not just you... this savings report doesn't make sense to anyone I know.

Advocacy groups. I really don't think this needs an explanation. Gimme an S. Gimme an H. Gimme an I. Gimme an L. Gimme another L. What does that spell? Rah! Rah! Rah!

"Some farmers." How about "the vast majority of agricultural land owners along with their non-agricultural neighbors"? "Some" would more appropriately apply to the advocates, because they're so few in number. But, despite the backhanded attempt to minimize opposition, some farmers still managed to pollute Invenergy's dream story. That's the best a lazy press could do.

There were a few other giggles in the few stories that were original journalism. I particularly liked this blurb:

Utility regulators in Missouri and Kansas have already approved construction of the line. An Invenergy spokesperson didn’t immediately respond to an email asking if the expansion plans required additional approvals.

Not only does it require additional approvals. It requires a WHOLE NEW APPLICATION.

And then there's this:

“We heard that story over and over: ‘We want to see more of it brought to Missouri,’” said Shashank Sane, who leads Invenergy’s transmission business, after a Monday news conference in St. Louis. “It was really about bringing benefits to the state.”

Invenergy did not disclose which Missouri entities it expects will buy the additional power, but it is “confident that the customer base is there,” said Sane.

Right, mystery customers. The same ones that have failed to buy the 250 MW leftover from the last offering.

Invenergy carefully created a whole stack of hay to hide its "we need a new connection point" needle. But all that hay may end up being too hard to chew.

2 Comments

Where's the Customers, Invenergy?

7/12/2022

4 Comments

When I said I could make a month of blog posts out of Invenergy's "Tiger Connector" scheme yesterday, maybe I was only half joking. Today, we're going to concentrate on the reality of merchant transmission. Grain Belt Express is a merchant transmission project.

A merchant transmission project is strictly a financial proposition. A company proposes that if it builds a transmission line between two points that load serving entities will find it so useful and economic that they will voluntarily negotiate a contract to use it. Just because Invenergy offers new transmission does not mean anyone will use it.

We need to separate Invenergy's false bravado about "energy" from the reality of merchant transmission in order to think logically about Invenergy's scheme. A transmission line is only a transmission line. It does not produce energy. It's strictly a roadway to get energy from one place to the other. Invenergy is only selling capacity on its transmission line (road), it is not selling energy. It is aptly compared to a toll road -- customer pays to use the roadway to transport something it finds useful and economic. If Invenergy had customers for Grain Belt Express, the only thing the customers would be purchasing is use of the transmission line. Any energy transmitted over the line would have to be purchased from an electricity generator under a separate contract at a separate price. In order to actually take electricity over the line, a customer would have to buy electricity from a point near one of the converter stations and then ship it to their point of use. GBE is a direct current (DC) transmission line. In order for electricity to use the line, it would first have to be converted from alternating current (AC) before being loaded on the line for use at its destination. When the DC electricity gets to its destination, it will once again have to be converted back to AC before being offloaded from the line. The conversion process wastes a considerable amount of energy. If you purchased AC energy from, say, Kansas, you'd lose a considerable portion of it in the two conversion processes before it arrived at your destination in, say, Missouri. If you were the customer, you'd eat the cost of that lost electricity you paid for.

As mentioned, a merchant transmission project is strictly voluntary. A merchant project is not vetted or planned for reliability, economic, or public policy purposes by regional transmission planners. Electric customers don't "need" it for reliability, economic or public policy purposes. It's simply something extra that customers would volunteer to purchase if they found it financially lucrative. And this has been the problem with merchant transmission in the Midwest. It's not attracting customers. Customers in the east are looking at offshore wind and other local renewables, like solar, to meet their renewable energy needs. Eastern utilities have NEVER looked at importing electricity from half a continent away using toll road transmission projects. The cost of the transmission to get it there must be added to the cost of the supposedly "cheap" energy from the Midwest, and the result is often equal to or more expensive than buying local renewables. Another factor for Eastern utilities (and states) is that building renewables locally provides an economic bump to the locality. Eastern states do not want to export all their energy dollars to a generator and transmission company thousands of miles away when they could create jobs and economic development at home. This is why merchant transmission for export has never worked.

First Clean Line Energy Partners, and now Invenergy, have previously claimed in Missouri PSC testimony that Eastern customers in PJM Interconnection will make up the vast majority of the customer base for Grain Belt Express because they can sell the capacity for more money there. Clean Line even offered a below-cost contract to a handful of Missouri municipalities in order to get the project approved as "useful" to Missouri. Clean Line purported that it would make the loss up in its sales to Eastern customers. Except we've never seen any evidence that those customers exist, and with Invenergy's big announcement yesterday that it will only construct the first "phase" of its project from Kansas to Missouri for the time being, I believe that demonstrates that those Eastern customers don't exist. If they did, GBE would be decreasing its offering in Missouri and increasing its offering to PJM.

So, what's left? Invenergy thinks it can maybe find enough suckers, err customers, in Missouri to buy service for importing 2500 MW of electricity for use in Missouri. Except, do those customers even exist? GBE has been offering "up to 500 MW" of service to Missouri customers since the Clean Line days. It has only secured a contract for "up to 250MW" with the municipalities. That extra 250MW has been for sale for years and it appears that nobody has purchased it. But yet Invenergy now thinks its service is so popular it will suddenly be able to sell ten times that amount. Does this even make sense? Where's the customers, Invenergy?

In media quotes yesterday, Invenergy tried to play coy about customers.

Invenergy did not disclose which Missouri entities it expects will buy the additional power, but it is “confident that the customer base is there,” said Sane.

The line is a so-called merchant line, meaning its costs wouldn’t be spread broadly across the region like most intrastate transmission lines. Instead, only utilities and other consumers that buy capacity on the line would pay.

Among those customers are more than three dozen small cities and towns across Missouri, which estimate they will save more than $12 million annually compared with coal plants that supply power under existing contracts.

So the only customers it has are the loss-leader priced ones it has had all along. If there were new customers, Invenergy would have been pushing them to the front of the quote line. Instead, the only advocates singing GBE's praises in yesterday's news coverage were business groups who don't buy electricity. Those aren't customers. Customers are load serving entities who buy electricity wholesale and sell to others at retail.

There is no indication that any new customers are eager to purchase capacity on GBE. Maybe Invenergy is trying to paint Tom Sawyer's fence to attract customers, however Missourians are wise to that game. Duh.

In another self-flagellating talking point yesterday, Invenergy claimed GBE would sell the equivalent of the output of 4 nuclear power plants to Missouri electric utilities. That electricity will be produced in Kansas, not Missouri. If Missouri is going to increase its electricity imports by an amount equal to 4 nuclear power plants, then it must decrease the amount of electricity currently produced in Missouri by the same amount. This is the death knell for 4 (or more) Missouri electric generation plants that currently employ thousands. Importing electricity over GBE isn't going to provide an amount of good-paying jobs equal to those lost. In addition, localities will lose the tax revenues they currently enjoy from those plants that will be shut down without an equal replacement from GBE. GBE is an economic loss to Missouri, no matter how much fluff and nonsense Invenergy tries to disseminate. This is the same reasoning the Eastern utilities use when rejecting GBE. It just makes sense.

And Invenergy has another problem with its new scheme. Investor owned utilities, like Ameren, are for-profit enterprises. Ameren is permitted by regulators to make a profit on the transmission it builds and the power it generates. If Ameren builds local renewables in Missouri, it earns a profit on them. If Ameren builds transmission in Missouri to transmit the renewable energy it generates, Ameren makes a profit. If, instead, Ameren buys capacity from GBE it is only reimbursed at cost of its purchase. There is no profit for Ameren. Likewise on the renewable generators -- if Ameren buys energy from Kansas there is no profit, they are only reimbursed dollar for dollar. So, why would Ameren sign a contract to use GBE to import energy when it could make more money owning local renewables and transmission. I might also add that local renewables don't need huge new transmission projects like GBE so they are ultimately cheaper than imports. In conclusion, why would Ameren buy the milk when it could own the cow? This is just another reason why I believe GBE's scheme won't work.

So much more malarkey to unravel. Next, let's look at Invenergy's media plan for this scheme. I challenge you readers to find any news story that mentions the new "Tiger Connector."

Until tomorrow...

4 Comments

How The Media Sausage Factory Cranks Out Fake News

4/30/2022

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What happens when the people who create "news" have a political or ideological bias? The "news" they crank out no longer presents facts and allows the reader to decide. Biased media thinks readers are too stupid to make the same biased conclusions they would when presented with actual facts, therefore the media makes up facts that are not really facts at all in order to skew the conclusion the reader would draw from the story without the made-up facts.

Here's a look inside the sausage factory of biased news creation that demonstrates how the media lies to you, dear reader.

Our case study: Price of Progress: Grain Belt Express Pits Public Benefit and Private Property Rights in Race Against Climate Change. Kind of a screwy headline for a piece that was supposed to tell landowner's stories. The headline tells you a lot. Race? The idea that we have to hurry up and "beat" climate change by building a transmission line with with only one customer for less than 10% of the line's capacity is so much created hogwash. In the global picture, the effect of Grain Belt Express is infinitesimal. It won't actually "beat" climate change. But it will beat agriculture and struggling farmers in Missouri, adding a new impediment to their production and a burden on their finances and heritage.

There's a lot screwy about this story, but let's focus on just one "fact" in the story:

For the 39 municipalities in Missouri signed up to buy power off the line, it’s an estimated $12.8 million in annual savings.

It's not a quote of someone's opinion, it's a statement of "fact". Facts require investigation on the part of a reporter, especially "facts" that present such a specific number. If there's an estimate with such a specific figure, then there must be data used to reach that estimate. Show us your math, right?

The municipalities have not shown anyone their math since January 2017. That's 5 years ago. In 2017, the municipalities' witness at the Missouri PSC said:

As stated in the rebuttal testimony of Duncan Kincheloe, MJMEUC’s president and general manager, our current arrangement with Illinois Power Marketing Company (“IPM”) for 100 MWs of energy and capacity will expire in 2021, and that contract currently serves the needs of the Missouri Public Energy Pool (MoPEP). We have been actively considering sources to replace this energy and capacity.

What was it that Kincheloe said?

In 2021, a contract for 100 MWs of energy and capacity with Illinois Power Marketing Company (IPM) (former Ameren coal plants in Illinois, now owned by Dynegy) will expire. That energy and capacity will need to be replaced. That contract currently serves MoPEP, a group of 35 Missouri cities for which MJMEUC provides full requirements for wholesale energy, capacity and ancillary services. The TSA with Grain Belt and the power purchase agreement with Infinity Wind would allow the MoPEP to replace the current 100 MWs of purchased power in MISO with more affordable energy. John Grotzinger will explain in his rebuttal testimony that while the TSA and corresponding contract with Infinity Wind will not by themselves replace the IPM contract, these contracts will form the cornerstone of the resource mix to replace the IPM contract.

So, the municipalities' savings argument rests on replacing IPM with GBE + a contract for wind in Kansas. A low price is supposed to replace a higher price and result in savings. But what year is this? It's 2022. The IPM contract expired last year. What did the municipalities replace that energy with? It can't be GBE, because GBE is still limping along trying to get permitted in Illinois. Nothing has been built. Was the new contract as expensive as IPM? Or was it cheaper? Where's the math using the new contract amount? Did the municipalities even do the math? It was the reporter's job to ask, especially since she was tipped off that there has been nothing shown since 2017 to back up their "estimate." They just keep spitting out the same numbers even though the underlying equation has changed drastically.

But the reporter has been unable to say whether or not she verified this "fact" in her story. First she claimed it was an estimate, as if using that word absolved her of verifying the estimated number. When asked if she did verify the number, she stopped responding. I will presume that means the answer is no. What a pity! She was quite engaging and promised to tell the real story that others in the media were missing. But, in the end, she ended up repeating the same old out-of-date information from the municipalities and other corporate propaganda from Invenergy.

Is the media incapable of telling a factual story? Must all truth be ground up in the media sausage factory before it is presented to a public presumed to be too ignorant to come to its own conclusions?

Don't count on them to tell a factual story.

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How Propaganda Works

4/19/2022

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Repeat something often enough and it becomes "fact." That's how propaganda works. Propaganda is defined as "information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view". It's information without any factual basis. It's just a simple phrase, repeated over and over endlessly until the public simply believes it is a fact.

The United States desperately needs new power lines.

Our grid is not inadequate to keep the lights on. Our grid is a carefully managed machine that is upgraded and rebuilt constantly to maintain reliability. But our grid is also a fertile money-maker for investor owned utilities and merchant electricity generators. Utilities make money investing in electric transmission that pays a double-digit return over the project's expected 40-year life. Our grid also enables for-profit electric generators to connect their product to far-flung customers, often at no cost to themselves. These are the entities spreading propaganda that our grid is somehow inadequate and needs to be rebuilt and expanded. They will make money building and upgrading, and electric consumers will pay the bill.

This guy really shouldn't be writing about energy. He has little practical understanding, and uses fluffy pieces written by biased pontificators. And, even then, he misquotes them to back up his ignorant theories, such as this statement:

Our transmission standstill has a number of consequences. First of all, it raises consumer prices. As this post at CanaryMedia makes clear, bad transmission hasn’t raised utility bills despite generation being cheaper than ever.

The canary in the coal mine piece shows that while the cost of generating renewables falls, the cost of building transmission to connect them rises. There's a limit on how much the cost of generation can fall, but there is no limit on how much transmission costs can rise. Transmission costs are rising at a higher rate than generation costs are falling. And we really haven't even begun building the amount of transmission utilities, generators, and their governmental and big green cheerleaders are pushing for. What is "bad transmission"? What is "transmission standstill"? I really don't know because neither means anything except in the dim mind of the author. Right there I realize that this guy knows nothing about transmission. But that's okay in a propaganda world because most of the people reading his brain farts have even less knowledge. That's how propaganda works!

Moving onto the next piece of propaganda:

A 2018 report by the nonprofit Americans for a Clean Energy Grid identified 22 shovel-ready projects that had been in existence for a decade or more. To get such projects off the ground, the report’s authors suggested streamlining project siting and permitting, passing a tax credit for transmission projects, and direct investment by the federal government.

First, Americans for a Clean Energy Grid is a Bill Gates-financed front group promoting new transmission that Bill and his super-rich global elite pals "need" to create a sweet investment honeypot for themselves (see section above about double-digit returns for 40 years). Second, most of the projects on the "shovel ready" list are not actually shovel ready and have serious regulatory or financial flaws that prevent them from ever being built (hence the government handouts). At least one of the projects on the "shovel-ready" list has been cancelled by its owner. Not shovel-ready, no matter how much American tax money gets showered on these private-profit endeavors.

The author sort of chokes on the fact that even though taxpayer subsidies have been requested, the subsidies simply cannot shut down due process for affected landowners.

Despite recent noise from the Biden administration about speeding up the sitting process, the same problems are still knocking off and slowing down transition projects.

The most recent and notable example is that of the Grain Belt Express. The transmission line, which would span nearly 800 miles across four midwest states, from Kansas to Indiana, connecting into the PJM Interconnection LLC grid, is at risk of being thwarted by House Bill 2005. The bill, brainchild of big ag groups across the region, would give any county in the line’s path the right to block construction.

Oh, right... "big ag." It's "big ag" (aka small family farm and ranch interest groups) vs. Chicago billionaire Michael Polsky, who has spent millions lobbying and influencing the Missouri legislature so that he may use eminent domain to take farm property for whatever price he wants to pay, instead of fairly negotiating for the use of other people's land in an open market. Acquiring land "cheaply" through the use of eminent domain does not save any money on transmission bills -- it just increases the project's profit that flows into Polsky's pockets.

Next they propagandize about the "savings" from GBE:

The project represents a special economic opportunity for the region’s rural communities which have struggled in recent times. The cheap wind power would provide significant savings to the small municipalities. What’s more, emissions would be brought down as well.

It represents additional agricultural production costs in rural communities as land is removed from production, or impeded in such a way that production becomes more expensive or impossible. It also spoils future land use. It is especially hard on small family farms, which constitute the majority of impacted properties.

So where's the opportunity? A handful of municipalities are relying on a back of the envelope calculation that was done more than 5 years ago based on energy contracts that have since expired. None of these supposed "savings" are anywhere close to real. Do the math, based on today's costs and contracts, and then tell me all about it. However, they refuse to update the calculations. That can only mean one thing: the "savings" have fallen or evaporated entirely. Propaganda not based on fact.

And here's the part that is most egregious:

Cumbersome regulations and NIMBYISM are mostly to blame for the nation’s stagnant transmission system.

The same article includes quotes from advocates of bill 2005: ‘“Grain Belt is currently working towards condemning our land,” Henke said in written testimony. “They have told us they will not negotiate with us and the price they tell us is what we get. This line will take out our shade trees in our pastures and cut through several fences. They are not willing to move the line at all to avoid some of these things that will greatly impact our farm.”’

I don’t want to completely disregard people like Henke’s misgivings, but no decision comes without a cost. At some point, we’re going to have to accept some of the costs associated with big transmission projects to reap the important benefits: Cheaper, cleaner electricity.

Excuse me there, Henry, but WE? WE??? What are you sacrificing here? You're not giving up anything at all. How dare you speak for "we" when you're not part of the "we"? If Henry was required to sacrifice his shade trees and his fences and the sanctity of his property and his ability to earn a living, along with a big chunk of his investments made to plan for retirement, like he expects the Henckes to sacrifice, I can guarantee you that Henry wouldn't think GBE was such a great idea after all. Henry only likes GBE because it's not in his back yard.

This makes Henry the biggest NIMBY of them all.

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When are Environmental Groups Going to Start Caring About the Environment?

4/9/2022

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Did you manage to catch this story this week? Wind energy company kills 150 eagles in US, pleads guilty kind of made the rounds this week, but some people simply didn't care. Now if a famous politician had killed 150 eagles on a hunting trip, it would have been 24/7 news. But it was just one of America's biggest energy conglomerates killing eagles while it "saved the planet" by generating electricity from wind, so it wasn't big news.

The story tells us

A subsidiary of one of the largest U.S. providers of renewable energy pleaded guilty to criminal charges and was ordered to pay over $8 million in fines and restitution after at least 150 eagles were killed at its wind farms in eight states, federal prosecutors said Wednesday.

NextEra Energy subsidiary ESI Energy was also sentenced to five years probation after being charged with three counts of violating the Migratory Bird Treaty Act during a court appearance in Cheyenne, Wyoming. The charges arose from the deaths of nine eagles at three wind farms in Wyoming and New Mexico.

But what does NextEra care? It's raking in billions of dollars every year in the form of production tax credits for generating electricity from wind. What's $8M between friends? NextEra is simply giving the government its own money back... a drop in the ocean of riches NextEra has stuffed into its own pocket over the years. I think NextEra has absolutely no remorse and will continue to kill as many birds as it wants. If it shuts the turbines down to save the eagles, then it doesn't earn as much money from the federal government, who pays for energy actually generated.

You should be outraged by this. But, more importantly, the "Big Green" organizations, like Sierra Club, should be outraged. But I don't see any of the big organizations quoted in the article coming to the defense of eagles.

Why? Remember this? When the Sierra Club was taking money from the gas industry and calling natural gas a "bridge fuel" to a cleaner environment? Are these big organizations now taking money from energy companies promoting big wind? Where do these organizations get the cash that makes up their oversized budgets? They get a lot of it from private "foundations", but where do the "foundations" get their cash? Nobody seems to care. Advocacy groups for big wind and solar get their money from electric utilities. NextEra has a position on ACORE's board of directors. ACORE doesn't even mention eagles. None of the entities making money hand over fist building and operating renewable energy facilities seem to care about the eagles.

Sierra Club got in a bind because its national policies conflicted with its individual members who saw gas destroying their local environment. The propaganda about "clean energy" we're all fed absolutely refuses to recognize that "clean energy" is also destroying our environment while purporting to save it. It's only a matter of time until the big environmental organizations are pushed by local members to stand against massive, industrial scale big wind and solar plants.

Perhaps it's coming sooner than they think...

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Invenergy and Special Interest Groups Mischaracterize Legislation to Prevent Passage

4/5/2022

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Another year, another attempt by privately-owned Chicago company Invenergy to completely mischaracterize Missouri legislation to prevent passage into law. Who controls Missouri elected representatives? Is it the citizens of Missouri? Or is it the profits of a super-rich out-of-state utility conglomerate?

HB 2005 was approved by the Missouri House and passed to the Senate, where a committee hearing will be held today. Right on cue, Invenergy, its special interest groups and biased media step right up to spin a web of lies about the legislation designed to prevent its passage.

What is HB 2005? In the interest of truth, perhaps you should actually READ it to find out what it does and what it does not do. You cannot rely on the media, who replaces actual quotes from the bill's language with alarmist rhetoric.

The actual bill does these things:

Defines "public service" to mean providing at least 50% of its capacity to serve Missourians.
Requires county commission approval of certificates to construct.
Requires transmission to provide at least 50% of its load to Missourians in order to use eminent domain.
Must compensate agricultural landowner at 150% of fair market value when using eminent domain.
Requires condemning commission to include at least one person who has been farming in the same county for at least 10 years.
If amount awarded in condemnation is greater than offer, court may award attorney's fees to property owner.

What does Invenergy and an alarmist media think this bill does?

"Pull the plug" or place "roadblocks" on GBE.
Hamper Invenergy from pursuing condemnation.
Unconstitutionally and retroactively kill GBE.
Legislation is "short-sighted."
Gives unfair advantage to fossil fuels.

Of course, the actual language of the bill does none of that. This is just generalized rhetoric trying to prevent any real reading or consideration of the legislation by Missouri senators. Kill the messenger and you don't have to read the message! What does the bill do? What the bill does, and no more.

And speaking of screechy rhetoric, let's look at some of the over-the-top claims and objections by Invenergy and its special interest supporters.

Invenergy spokesman Patrick Whitty slammed the House bill, calling it “an astonishing move in the wrong direction” at a time when global energy is in a security crisis.

“Among its many other impacts, the bill would unconstitutionally and retroactively kill Missouri’s largest energy infrastructure project, the Grain Belt Express, a project essential to American energy security that will connect millions of consumers to domestically produced, affordable, and reliable clean energy,” Whitty said. “The energy from the Grain Belt Express is the equivalent of 15 million barrels of oil annually, produced and delivered right here in the Midwest.”

My, my, what timely nonsense! Now GBE is about the war in Ukraine and Russian oil? If you ever thought that Invenergy's public relations spinners are just making crap up to fit the politics du jour, here's your proof.

And look... there's the predictable "unconstitutional" claim. This is so completely dog eared and worn that it actually dates back to Clean Line Energy Partners. Constitutionality can only be determined by a court. Invenergy, its supporters, the media, and even the Missouri legislature are not a court. Their claims of unconstitutionality are nothing more than one-sided opinion. It is the legislature's job to make laws. It is the court's job to interpret them. No court has ever deemed this legislation unconstitutional, therefore it is constitutional until a court says it is not. If legislators are so scared of "unconstitutionality" that they fail to make new laws, then what's to prevent every special interest lobbyist from claiming a law it doesn't like is unconstitutional? See how that works? Claims of unconstitutionality by special interests should be ignored by the legislature while it goes about doing the people's work.

The Missouri Supreme Court earlier ruled that Grain Belt be granted public utility status because the $2.3 billion project is in the public interest.

Here's another recycled claim that holds no water. As explained already, the Court interprets the law. Under the law currently in effect, the court said GBE was a public utility. However, that law was not written to knowingly grant a private profit corporation eminent domain authority to use Missourian's private property for its own gain. If the law changes, then the Court's opinion will change. The Court interprets existing law. It does not make law. Making laws is the job of the legislature. If the legislature defines public utility to exclude merchant transmission that does not serve Missourians and only takes their property for its own private profit, then the Court shall find that GBE is not a public utility.

The project also has garnered the support of Sen. Bill White, R-Joplin, who says it will invest millions of dollars in the state’s rural areas, boost the local energy supply and help ensure energy independence.

White said Monday he had not yet reviewed the latest House bill, which moved out of the House last week on a 102-41 vote. But, he said retroactively targeting the company after it has already started buying land would be unconstitutional.

Another blast from the past. Senator White claims the bill is "unconstitutional" before even reading it. As if a Court would operate the same way? Perhaps Senator White should spend more time investigating all the new electric transmission projects proposed by MISO to cross his district before he pans legislation designed to limit eminent domain and give landowners a fair shake. Senator White's constituents are not being served here, just an out-of-state corporation. Who does Senator White work for?

Labor unions, environmental groups and the Missouri Association of Municipal Utilities oppose the changes.

Jake Hummel, a former state senator from St. Louis who now oversees the Missouri AFL-CIO, said the project will create jobs as it crosses the property of 570 landowners in eight northern counties.
“The quest for American-made energy, while creating 1,500 Missouri jobs, is an opportunity our state cannot afford to pass up,” Hummel said.

Michael Berg of the Sierra Club’s Missouri chapter said the legislation is short-sighted in a time when energy production is evolving.
“More legal barriers for wind energy transmission give an unfair advantage to the highly polluting fossil fuel industry,” Berg told members of the House Judiciary Committee.
In addition, Berg said more than a dozen communities have signed up to purchase power from the line, including Kirkwood, Columbia, Hannibal and Farmington.
“The power delivered along this line is expected to save dozens of rural Missouri communities more than $12 million annually,” Berg said.
As an added benefit, Invenergy says it will use the power lines to also offer broadband service that could bring improved internet to over one million rural Missourians, including 250,000 within 50 miles of the transmission line.

So, labor unions think GBE will provide 1,500 jobs? That's ridiculous, computer generated garbage. GBE will actually COST Missouri jobs in agriculture and in local power production. "American made energy" is another fluffy political talking point. ALL electricity used in Missouri is "made in America." If GBE is not built, it will still be made in America, and actually closer to home, right in Missouri itself. So much propaganda piled on here it insults the intelligence of the average reader.

As far as the Sierra Club goes... there is no such thing as "wind energy transmission." Electrons are not color coded and electrons from all sources are mixed together on transmission lines. There is nothing preventing GBE from carrying electricity from any source and in fact it must offer its project to any generator who will pay its price.

About those dozen communities? There are 955 municipalities in Missouri. A dozen is not 50%. As well, the $12M savings is completely out of date and was based on municipal contracts that have since expired. Since the municipalities have replaced the very expensive Prairie State contract that expired last year with something cheaper, there is no longer any legitimacy whatsoever to the $12M figure. It may be less, it may be more. In fact, GBE may actually be MORE EXPENSIVE than current contracts. Of course, nobody knows because GBE and the municipalities refuse to do the math. What are they hiding?

Broadband? Does Missouri even need this? And where is the guarantee that it must be provided as a condition of building the line? Who will pay for the last mile of line? Can Missouri even afford to finish this? And what about newer sources for internet service, such as satellite internet? Might that end up being cheaper? Why pour money into antiquated technology like broadband and overhead transmission on lattice towers? Invenergy isn't in the broadband business, but it is in the business of making empty promises to Missouri.

Buyer beware.

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Censorship and Propaganda Will Fail

3/30/2022

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People will always oppose new infrastructure that disturbs their life and imposes burdens without benefits. The push for renewable energy is running headlong into push back from the people. How renewable energy proponents deal with this push back is key to actually achieving renewable energy goals. Censorship and propaganda are not an effective weapon. Instead, smart developers will put their energy into avoiding impacts altogether. If there are little to no impacts on the people, the people simply won't care enough to form entrenched and formidable opposition groups that are increasingly successful in stopping projects with outsized impacts. No opposition translates into successful projects. Stop waving your red cape at the bull.

Like this NPR article about "misinformation." NPR asserts

In between posts selling anti-wind yard signs and posts about public meetings opposing local wind projects, there were posts that spread false, misleading and questionable information about wind energy.

Says who?

NPR sent Facebook a sampling of the posts from anti-renewable community pages. Facebook spokesman Kevin McAlister said in an emailed statement, "We take action against content that our fact-checking partners rate false as part of our comprehensive strategy to keep viral, provably false claims from spreading on our apps. The examples shared with us don't appear to meet that threshold as they have only even been shared a handful of times over a period of several years."

Who are these Facebook fact-checkers and what makes them experts with so much knowledge that they wield the power to shut down free speech that they find unacceptable? What ever happened to this concept?

Freedom of speech was the first amendment made to our Constitution:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Except Facebook isn't the government. It's a social media experiment that has become victim of its own success. Social media is for spreading the ideas and opinions of individuals to a wider audience assembled by the wonders of technology. It was never intended to be an encyclopedia of facts. But then the easy dissemination of ideas and opinions by real people started to get political. Dumb people with too much time on their hands began to debate, okay argue, on Facebook about politics... as if reading blather on an internet platform ever changed someone's opinion, or vote. Political beings needed to win their ridiculous political arguments, so they began to tilt the playing field to get a little extra help. They believed ad hominems to be helpful; an attack on the person with the idea, instead of the idea itself. But even that didn't quite work, so they upped the ante by simply removing these people's right to free speech by labeling their ideas "misinformation." And then they devolved into simply canceling these people by removing them from internet society altogether. Facebook, for its part, is a willing participant in this game. And it's all political. When did we start allowing political opinion to run our lives and ruin our social relationships? It think it happened right around the time 24/7 cable news shows invaded our homes. And its creeping invasion has slowly spread into today's abridging of free speech through "misinformation" claims that attempt to control your very thoughts. Simply telling someone that you don't like their idea or opinion is no longer sufficient. Instead they seek to burn those kind of unacceptable thoughts out of your brain through punishment and social isolation.

Thinkpol are no longer scary fiction. They're here, and they infiltrate every segment of our society. But no matter how hard they try, they will never erase independent thought.

There's more "misinformation" spread by renewable energy and transmission proponents than by its opposition. But control comes from claiming Thinkpol status and making biased determinations of what is true or false. It's not about facts though, it's about opinion. It's about erasing those thoughts that don't agree with the government's determination that you must sacrifice your home and your property so that other people can benefit without sacrificing their own homes and property. It's sanctimonious elitism at its finest.

But the people will continue to resist. An epic battle is brewing. Who will win is not as important as who will lose. We all lose when land use battles waste enormous amounts of money, time and energy. But what if we never have this battle at all? What if all the effort currently being poured into censorship and propaganda was instead directed at developing new energy solutions that didn't require any sacrifice? Smaller, localized energy sources where the impacts are visited on the beneficiaries have been rejected in favor of massive production and massive impacts. Why? Because certain elite are going to make massive profits owning and operating them. This includes new electric transmission, where there's lots of money to be made by creating a "need" that wouldn't exist if energy was produced where it is used.

Censorship and propaganda is eroding our basic freedoms, but it can never truly control our thoughts or our right to peaceably assemble and petition our government for a redress of grievances. There are better options than continuing our messy slide down the very slippery slope to totalitarianism.

Think about it... while you still can.

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Invenergy Trips Over Its Grain Belt Lies

Hiding Information in Plain Sight

Magic Math Is For Fools

Invenergy Manufactures News

Where's the Customers, Invenergy?

How The Media Sausage Factory Cranks Out Fake News

How Propaganda Works

When are Environmental Groups Going to Start Caring About the Environment?

Invenergy and Special Interest Groups Mischaracterize Legislation to Prevent Passage

Censorship and Propaganda Will Fail

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StopPATH Blog